"We want to encourage congregations to consider alignment with the
national Network of Anglican Communion Dioceses and Parishes," said
Eric Crawford, a member of St. James. His group would like congregants
who disagree with Episcopal Church actions to "know that they have
alternatives. We want to encourage people to not give up and not go
along (with changes) or bail for another denomination or other
churches."

Openly gay Episcopal clergyman V. Gene Robinson was elected 62-45 at
the 74th triennial General Convention of the Episcopal Church meeting
in Minneapolis. Among those voting for Robinson was the Rt. Rev. Robert
Shahan, bishop of the Diocese of Arizona, whose 1999 "Epistle on Human
Sexuality" called for an end to intolerance toward homosexuality.

The convention’s vote set off a walkout and protests and precipitated a
meeting of conservatives in October in Plano, Texas, that attracted 45
bishops and 2,600 of the church’s faithful. Out of the meeting came the
new network whose charter was adopted Jan. 20 with representatives of
12 Episcopal dioceses. The charter asserted that Robinson’s election
exemplifies the denomination’s departure from "historic faith and
order," bringing "immense harm, tearing at the fabric of our communion
at its deepest level."

The American Anglican Council, which has nurtured the new network,
began in 1996 and boasts about 50 bishops and a mailing list of more
than 50,000.

It has raised fears of schism in the Episcopal Church, the 2.4 million-
member American body of the worldwide Anglican Communion. The U.S.
church also faces estrangement from the 37 other international
provinces, especially those in Africa, whose leaders have blasted the
U.S. church’s acceptance of a gay bishop.

"We don’t want to come across as divisive," Crawford said of his work
with the Arizona council. "We are not trying to destroy what the
(Episcopal) Diocese of Arizona is or what they are trying to do."

He said the alternative network is confronting "some deep theological
differences that need to be addressed in a straightforward way and are
not just papered over." Respect for Scripture and "how we view
ourselves as the church" are also key matters, he said.

The issues go well beyond Robinson, said Kathleen Fairman, a new member
of the vestry, or church board, of Christ Church of the Ascension. "The
issue tends to be reported as if there is one issue, the issue of
homosexuality. To me, it is addressing the question: Can we as
Christian people do whatever we want to, based on our feelings, which
are unreliable? Or is there a set of absolutes, divine, reliable
standards that we are obligated to follow. I choose to beli eve that we
have standards."

Crawford offered a similar view.

"What it basically gets down to is, did man create God? Or did God
create man? That is where I draw the fault line, basically, because
most of the arguments used to insert innovation into wellestablished
church doctrine tends to deny the authority of Scripture in some
sense," he said.

During the past 15 years, Crawford said, the church has drifted from
being "redemptive" to a church "more therapeutic." Thus, the
"homosexuality issue is just presenting issues of much deeper
theological differences" derived partly from the a deeper national
cultural split.

While the rectors of their churches have spoken out against the
decision regarding Robinson, it has been left to lay people to spread
the word about the Arizona Anglican Council. Clergy will only give
"some guarded statements — and guarded they should be," said Gene
Hutloff of Glendale, who works in lay education in the Episcopal
Church. "They are all under obedience to the bishop."

Lay people, he said, have greater freedom than pastors to speak out.

"There is a great amount of freedom of expression in the Anglican
community, in the Episcopal Church," Hutloff said. "Right now, there is
chill in the air caused by a collective attitude of political
correctness where the gay agenda is concerned. It is a small price to
pay," he said, to deal with the rejection and people rolling their eyes
when he and his group challenge the place of homosexuals in the church.

To those who repeatedly say "the Episcopal Church has had gay bishops
in the past — they just were not openly gay," Hutloff said, "there have
always been humans. There has always been sin in the human condition,
and it would be theologically incorrect to say that even clergy are
exempt from sin — or even bishops."

It’s difficult to determine what the Robinson vote has done across
Arizona congregations, Hutloff said.

"We are heartbroken that people are leaving the church," he said.

He noted that members are leaving parishes, sometimes without saying
why.

Bishop Shahan "doesn’t see things the way we do and is not at all
sympathetic to what we have tried to do," Crawford said. "In the past,
we have tried to open up dialogue, and there hasn’t been much interest
in that.

"We have five congregations that are pretty much on board with us,"
Crawford said.

Tempe’s St. James and St. Luke’s at the Mountain Episcopal Mission in
Phoenix have aligned with the American Anglican Council, while Christ
of the Ascension is in the process, he said. They are also working with
concerned Episcopalians in congregations in Flagstaff and Tubac.

No one from the bishop’s office at the Episcopal Diocese of Arizona
returned calls to respond to the formation of the Arizona Anglican
Council or issues raised by the group.

The diocese’s leadership will begin to change April 24, when the Rev.
Canon Kirk Stevan Smith, 52, is consecrated as a bishop adjutor. The
six-month transition will conclude with Shahan’s retirement in October.

END